A great classic means a man whom one can praise without having read. — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
A new philosophy generally means in practice the praise of some old vice. — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
Man is more himself, man is more manlike, when joy is the fundamental thing in him, and grief the superficial. Melancholy should… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
It is not only possible to say a great deal in praise of play; it is really possible to say the highest… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
That all war is physically frightful is obvious; but if that were a moral verdict, there would be no difference between a… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
Leaving the complications of the human breakfast-table out of account, in an elemental sense, the egg only exists to produce the chicken.… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
Literary men are being employed to praise a big business man personally, as men used to praise a king. They not only… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
...I will praise the English climate till I die—even if I die of the English climate. There is no weather so good… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
Man is more himself, man is more manlike, when Joy is the fundamental thing in him, and Grief the superficial. Melancholy should… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
I do not know much about Mohammed or Mohammedanism. I do not take the Koran to bed with me every night. But,… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
The aim of good prose words is to mean what they say. The aim of good poetical words is to mean what they do… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
Youth is always too serious, and just now it is too serious about frivolity. — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
Tradition does not mean a dead town; it does not mean that the living are dead but that the dead are alive. It means… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
It is shorter to state the things forbidden than the things permitted; precisely because most things are permitted and only a few things forbidden. — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
Everyone seems to assume that the unscrupulous parts of journalism will be the frivolous or jocular parts. This is against all ethical experience. Jokes… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
For Scotland has a double dose of the poison called heredity; the sense of blood in the aristocrat, the sense of doom in the… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
Faith is always at a disadvantage; it is a perpetually defeated thing which survives all conquerors. — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
A building is akin to dogma; it is insolent, like dogma. Whether or no it is permanent, it claims permanence, like a dogma. People… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
The triangle of truisms, of father, mother and child, cannot be destroyed; it can only destroy those civilizations which disregard it. — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
Criticism is only words about words, and of what use are words about such words as these? — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
What we suffer from today is humility in the wrong place...The old humility was a spur that prevented a man from stopping; not a… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
Plato was only a Bernard Shaw who unfortunately made his jokes in Greek. — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
